


Burn You Up and I'll Burn You Down

by raven_aorla



Series: Stay With Me I Need Support [1]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Brainwashing, Dark!Jack, F/M, M/M, Reprogramming, dark!Doctor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-20
Updated: 2012-11-20
Packaged: 2017-11-19 03:03:09
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,563
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/568347
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/raven_aorla/pseuds/raven_aorla
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Master escapes the Time Lock, now hoping to get the Doctor's attention. It's Jack that finds him and decides the Master needs to be reformed. Slash, non-con, torture, Dark!Jack, references to Torchwood.</p><p>Not my characters.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Burn You Up and I'll Burn You Down

**Author's Note:**

> Pilgrim knows the road to go  
> How many times we've told you so  
> (Burn you up, and I'll burn you down)  
> (Burn you up, and I'll burn you down)  
> No rhyme or reason  
> No way to make it easy 'til it's done…
> 
> …When they lose you, it can bruise you  
> (Burn you up, and I'll burn you down)  
> (Burn you up, and I'll burn you down)  
> Break me open, I need someone to see me  
> (Burn you up, and I'll burn you down)  
> (Burn you up, and I'll burn you down)  
> Make me feel it, make me feel
> 
> Peter Gabriel

He knew it was easy to track him. Follow the skeletonized bodies and ravaged stores of all sorts of food on this desolate, barely-colonized moon, the tales of the skeleton-flash man with his lightning hands, and he could easily be found. He was counting on it; his escape through the Time Lock had not been kind to his coherence and ability to plot (though his grasp of reality remained intact) so he was relying on one simple thing to get him away from here.

But of the two people who could reach this place and would want to capture him, he ran into the wrong one. The Doctor would never have taken him out with a sniper shot from a tranquilizer gun.

He awoke in a cold, damp, dimly lit room, feeling utterly enervated. Lifting his head was a tremendous effort. His motions and thoughts were drugged and slow. He noticed the manacle around his left ankle, chained to the wall.

"There's a drug that stops you burning up your life force, which was the thing giving you unnatural superpowers," said the tall, dark figure standing in the far corner, his existence screaming with wrongness. "It'll take a few days of treatment for it to become permanent. As a side effect, it's made you weak and helpless, and you'll stay that way until the full treatment is done and I can stop giving you the injections."

"Does the Doctor know?"

Captain Jack Harkness stepped across the narrow space and knelt in front of the Master, who sank towards the wall in an effort to get away. "He would be entirely too nice to you, and you'd get away again, and billions would suffer for it. Me, I hate you. The only reason I won't kill you is because that would devastate the Doctor. But before I met the Doctor I was a Time Agent who specialized in torture."

The Master tried to push him away, but his arms were heavy. Jack easily grasped both wrists in one of his large hands and pinned them against the wall, above the Master's head. He was so close that their noses almost touched. "He can have you when I'm finished."

"What are you going to do?" He shut his eyes against the dizziness that was Jack, the dissonance and vertigo and cacophony that was his existence, like staring at a sun that has for some reason turned purple but is even brighter than it would have been yellow, a sun that chatters in a high screechy voice and is diseased and horrifying.

"Well, there's always giving you the toned-down version of stuff you did to me during that year – remember that? Of course I wouldn't be able to do as much because I don't think the Doctor would want me to put you through a regeneration. But I noticed of all the ways you could have hurt me, in all that time, you never physically touched me." With his free hand, Jack stroked the side of the Master's face, causing a shudder of revulsion.

"Please…"

Jack chuckled softly. "This was also when you temporarily undid the aging and raped the Doctor a few dozen times. So I figure what can damage you the least but traumatize you the most is…" A hand around the Master's throat to hold his head still, the other hand trapping his, the Freak, the Abomination forced his lips against the Master's. He bit his lip, causing the Master to involuntarily open his mouth a fraction, and used that opening to slither his tongue inside, probing and gloating.

After a minute or so of stoically-born agony, the Master was relieved when Jack let go of him and stood. "So, what do you think? Rather I break all your fingers?"

"You're going to do what you like anyway."

"You learn quickly." Jack produced a pair of handcuffs from his pockets as well as a ball gag and a silk necktie. He placed them on the floor out of the Master's reach. Then he began to pull off the Master's hoodie.

"Oh no no no no!" The Master fought back as best he could, but it was like boxing underwater, his movements stalled. Within five minutes he was naked to the waist with his clothes flung away from the chain's reach. Jack took his coat off and laid it beside the Master's moldy shirt, retrieved the handcuffs, and threw the Master onto the floor with more force than necessary, snapping them on briskly.

"Please…Jack…sorry…the Doctor won't like…m'sorry…"

"You made me listen to you talk for hours on end, mister, and if you think I'm up for more of that you really are crazy." A knee on the Master's back, Jack yanked his head back by the still-platinum hair and fastened on the gag.

It was easy enough to keep him on the floor while Jack pulled off his jeans and boxers, paying almost no attention to the Master's feeble struggles. He knotted the tie around the Master's neck backwards, clearly to limit his air supply, heightening the sensations of how he was being violated.

Jack used a condom and an almost-sufficient dab of lubrication from somewhere the Master couldn't see, but he gave the Master no preparation or time to adjust. Jack also bit and scratched, at one point drawing blood from his shoulder. He was being strangled in a way dangerous for a human but still quite unpleasant for a Time Lord, but what hurt was his psyche trying to escape the wrong and should-not-be that was filling him with its perversion in both mind and body.

51st century humans, particularly those with Time Agent training, had a moderate level of telepathic ability. As Jack brutally fucked him, he also had a finger to one of his temples, spilling forth memories of all the tortures the Master had visited upon the immortal. The assault was on all fronts and filled his senses with no possibility of mental distraction.

His hope of respite when Jack came was snatched away from him. Jack merely withdrew, stroke himself to hardness again, and plunged right back in.

This happened five times.

Finally Jack was putting his own clothes back on. He tossed the Master's clothes in his direction but didn't uncuff or ungag him. "I'll come back in a couple hours with your next dose," he said quietly, not sparing him a glance before exiting and slamming the door.

.......

He lay covered in sweat and with a thin trickle of blood down his thighs – his shoulder had long since scabbed. He was terrified that he was going to be sick and that he would choke on it if the gag was still there.

No sooner had the thought crossed his mind than the door opened again. In came a ridiculously boyish young man with floppy brown hair, a tweed jacket topped with a bowtie, a basin, a tall glass of water, and a med kit. When their eyes met the Master knew.

His first action upon having his mouth free was to whisper, "Doctor?" His second was to vomit into the proffered basin.

The Doctor opened some kind of hidden chute in the far wall and shunted out the basin. "It's been a while, hasn't it? How'd you get out?"

His strength felt even less than before Jack's assaults. "You have to get me out of here, please, Doctor. I won't try to escape. Just take me to your TARDIS."

"We are in my TARDIS. Jack is doing me a favor." The Doctor helped the Master into a sitting position, produced a moistened antiseptic cloth, and wiped up the blood.

This was perhaps the most distressing thing yet. "You told him to…"

"Have some water, Master. Hydration is important." The Master tried to turn away from the glass, but the Doctor gripped the back of his head and forced him to drink. "There's a good boy. Let me help you put your trousers on."

They were still looped around the chain, as were his underpants. The Doctor maneuvered the Master's legs like a mannequin's. "I thought you forgave me."

"Course I did. You know we're nothing without each other. But I've realized that you're too dangerous to innocent people, especially with those abilities, so I cooked up the antidote for the life-force draining as well as your pathological lust for power, silencing the drums. Unfortunately for the second part to last there has to be a psychological component as well." The Doctor retrieved the hoodie and pulled it over the Master's head, not bothering to unlock the handcuffs or put his arms through the sleeves. "You shouldn't get too cold like that."

"The drums are gone now. Rassilon took them away."

"That's wonderful news, but the point stands that you were still eating people."

"I was so hungry, Doctor."

"You could have eaten animals or plants. You ate people. Simply removing the drums didn't fix everything."

"I wanted your attention."

"Ever heard of distress signals? Psychic paper messages?"

"Must I still be cuffed? It's uncomfortable."

The Doctor smoothed an errant hair out of the Master's eyes. "It's supposed to be. You see, in order for me to rebuild your mind into something sane and peaceful, you have to have a complete nervous breakdown. It's like how you must demolish a building before building something new on the plot."

The Master slumped. "So you're having the Freak brutalize me because you can't do it yourself. Until I crack."

"Unfortunately, yes. I'm so sorry. But I won't let him damage you permanently, and when all this is over we can see the universe together like I promised." The young-old Doctor kissed the Master on top of the head. "Have you gone to the toilet within sixteen hours?"

"Yes."

"Then you should be all right for another forty-two. I'm afraid we can't let you sleep. If we find you falling asleep I'm sending Jack back in. See you in a bit." The Doctor turned to leave.

"It was our mothers," the Master called after him.

The Doctor stopped and looked back. "Yes?"

"Of those who voted to do what they did to me to bring back Gallifrey, there were two dissenters. One was your mother. The other was mine."

A sad half-smile spread across the Doctor's face. "They helped you escape?"

"They'd rigged a teleporter that couldn't be programmed with coordinates but could escape the Lock. It could only carry one. They were in the cell with me as we waited for Gallifrey to fall."

"We had to get our genius from somewhere."

"Yeah."

The Doctor sighed. "I'm very grateful to them." Then he left.

The Master curled up in a corner, careful not to put pressure on his cuffed hands, and let tears fall silently.

.......

When Jack returned twelve hours and twenty-six minutes and twelve seconds later, he had a syringe and a small black bag. He pressed the Master against the wall and plunged it the needle into his jugular vein. "Something's changed you, Jack," the Master murmured.

"The Doctor helped make me into someone who protected the innocent," Jack replied, throwing the syringe into the garbage chute and teasing off the Master's sweatshirt. "But we're different men, me and the Doctor. He couldn't kill you when Earth was at stake, because you were his old friend and he believes he can still save you. When I had to make that kind of choice, I killed my grandson. The Doctor may have doomed Gallifrey twice, but he didn't do it with his bare hands, even though an innocent child who loved him was begging for him to stop."

Jack's words were soft but his eyes glittered harshly. The Master felt a fear unrelated to Jack's immortal nature. "Then there's nothing I can say."

"No. The peoples of the universe need to be safe from you, and if this is the only way I can both ensure that and not hurt the Doctor anymore than he has been, I will do it without a bit of regret no matter how pathetic you end up becoming."

He withdrew a key from his pocket, uncuffed one of the Master's wrists, and then brought the cuffs around to shackle them in front instead. He tied the cuffs to a thick rope that hung from the ceiling, holding the Master's wrists uncomfortably high. He had to stand on tiptoe or suffer pain in his shoulders. Jack pulled down his trousers and underwear.

The contents of the bag proved to be a small pocketknife and a dermal regenerator. "Now, I'm going to write all the different ways you killed me on your skin with this knife. The dermal regenerator is to heal enough of the cuts that you don't lose consciousness or retain scars. I'm gagging you again because I want to spare the Doctor your screaming, and I'm blindfolding you because I think it's funny. Try to kick me with your free leg and I'll show you how much stamina I've developed over the years."

......

Again he was left alone, but this time for two hours in the stretched-out dark. Finally the warm scent of the Doctor filled the room. "You've had a cowboy in here," the Doctor said deadpan, removing the gag and blindfold but not meeting his gaze.

"You're not enjoying this," the Master said hoarsely as the Doctor let his arms down and helped him get into a relatively more comfortable sitting position.

"Neither of us are. Jack may not like you, but he finds sex with someone unwilling to be disgusting, and torturing others is part of a past he doesn't like thinking about." The Doctor wiped the sweat from the Master's brow with a clean, damp cloth and lightly rubbed away the bloodstains all over his body.

"I promise to stop. I'll do whatever you say. Just don't…"

"You've turned me down too many times for me to take that on faith, I'm afraid." The Doctor locked a shock collar onto the Master's neck, then uncuffed and unchained him. He gave him a new set of clothes, loose-fitting white pajamas. When the Master tried to stand to put the pants on, he nearly fell over, and the Doctor had to help him up.

"I had to send away the two people I was traveling with," the Doctor said with regret once the Master was dressed. "They wouldn't have been able to handle what Jack and I have to do to you to make you better. I miss them already."

"I'm so sorry," the Master replied with all the venom he could summon, rubbing his wrists.

That sad half-smile returned, and the Doctor gave him a fluffy blanket with moons and stars silk-screened on. "I suggest you lie down and rest a while. The collar will jolt you awake if you start falling asleep, but you need all the recuperation you can get. Would you like me to stay with you for an hour?"

"No."

"Right, then." And the Doctor left, turning the lights off as he did so.

In the darkness the Master allowed himself to wish he had answered differently.

……………………………………………………………………………………..

Jack returned nine hours and fifty-six minutes and nineteen seconds later, this time naked, carrying a leash and a slender length of rope, and hard. He grabbed the curled-in-a-fetal-position Master by the collar, efficiently knotted his hands behind his back, and attached the leash to the collar.

"You're going to do as I say," Jack said quietly, seating himself and pulling the resisting Master towards him by the leash.

"Why?"

"First, because you made me watch you do this to the Doctor. Second, because I can do this." Jack snapped the fingers of his free hand and the collar enveloped the Master in agony. He let him shudder with electricity for ten seconds before snapping his fingers again. "Understand?"

Blinking back tears, the Master nodded.

"You will not speak unless spoken to, and you will address me as 'Sir'. You are going to suck me off with all the talent at your disposal, as many times as I like. If I find you wanting, I'm going to choke you. If you bite, I'm going to shock you."

"Yes, sir."

Jack stroked his hair. "Good. Now, I'm going to be sharing some old memories of mine, and you're going to take them in and not fight back."

"Yes, sir."

The Master was pulled down and forced to take in Jack's burning-hot (human body temperature in perfect health was like Time Lord temperature in delirious fever) length into his mouth. Jack kept the leash wrapped around his right hand, tugging at intervals. His left hand grasped the Master's right temple and part of his forehead.

The Master had not known previously that Jack had spent several centuries buried alive, and only a few minutes after learning this he had experienced more of the details than any sane person would want to know. It even made him lose track of time.

Eventually what he thought was all part of remembering suffocating in a tomb turned out to be him crying when his mouth was full, Jack tightening and tightening his grip. "Swallow and I'll let you up," Jack hissed.

He did what he was told, so he could stop being force-fed the millions of deaths Jack had come back from. Jack let go of the leash and kicked him away.

The Master struggled upright and sniffed to clear his nose. He could feel tear-tracks wetting his face. He noticed Jack seemed shell-shocked and had a few tears of his own.

"I'm sorry," the Master said, and wondered at how real the words seemed to be.

"Shut up."

"I went too far a long time ago."

"Shut the fuck up." Jack snapped his fingers and left.

It took fifteen minutes and forty-two seconds before the Master realized that he could snap his own fingers to stop the pain.

......

Thirty-six minutes and twenty-nine seconds later, the Doctor came with a wheelchair. "Hello good cop…" the Master whispered, feeling woozy.

"If you feel like making it sound that simple, yes," the Doctor replied with the sad half-smile, untying the Master and hoisting him into the chair.

The Master started giggling and singing off-key as the Doctor wheeled him out. "Oh I could throw you in the lake or feed you poisoned birthday cake..."

"I have decided, Master, and you're going to live."

It was a cozy bathroom with lots of red hangings and wood accents, and a big brass tub. The Master clumsily used the toilet once he realized the Doctor wasn't leaving him alone. This earned a fuller smile and the removal of the collar. "Wouldn't do for you to electrify the whole tub. Take your clothes off, dear."

As the Master fumbled with his clothes, the Doctor turned on the water. Then he took off his own clothes. "How many hundreds of years has it been since we've done this?"

"Mmm," the Master mumbled, unsure of what to do with himself and having trouble thinking.

"Oh, before I forget." The Doctor, most unselfconsciously naked, pulled another hypodermic needle out of the medicine cabinet. The Master let himself be injected without protest. "Good boy."

"Yes, Doctor."

Once the tub was full the bathroom filled with steam. The Doctor took his hand and gently pulled him into the water. "The drug reset your appetite to slightly below a normal Time Lord's, but you may have a sandwich after you're clean."

"Mmm." He wasn't hungry. He sat limply in the hot, soothing water, letting the Doctor rub him slowly with a soapy sponge.

"Did your rescuers say anything else to you?"

"What?"

"Our mothers. Did they say anything else?"

The Doctor kept looking younger and younger, but his ancient eyes never changed. The Master looked into them and said, "Yours was proud of you."

The Doctor let out a long exhalation and wrapped his arms around the Master. "Good," he said, croaking a little on the word.

"Mine pitied me."

"Oh, Koschei." And the Doctor kissed him.

………………………………………………………………………………………………….

The Doctor had the Master settled into a friendlier, better-lit room with an actual (if fairly Spartan) bed and a video screen on one wall. "Would you like my company for a bit?" he asked.

"Yes, please," the Master said.

Then there was a knock on the door. "Doctor? Don't forget you owe me something."

At the sound of his voice, the Master tightened the fluffy star-and-moon blanket around himself. The Doctor rose to his feet. "Can it wait, Jack?"

"You're the one who offered the terms."

"All right, then. I'll be back in about two hours. You may sleep if you wish."

Just after the Doctor left, the screen switched on, and a smugly grinning Jack waved. "Just between you and me, I'm letting you watch." He stepped aside and revealed a wide, luxurious bed with silk sheets and leather restraints at the headboard.

"No…" the Master whispered.

"Thank you for helping me," The Doctor said when he entered the room, unaware of the camera. "And I'm glad you were willing to accept this as repayment."

Jack wound an arm around the Doctor's waist – for the first time in their interaction Jack was taller than him – and pulled him close, burying his nose in his hair and inhaling deeply. "I promise you'll enjoy it."

"Don't worry about it," the Doctor replied, and the Master leapt up and tried to open the door (though he was not at all surprised to find it securely locked).

He began to curse when he saw Jack slowly undressing the Doctor, kissing each newly-bared patch of skin. The Doctor was not resisting, but neither was he responding. The Master knew the Doctor had a strong martyr complex, but willingly letting the Freak take him? With all the horror even he, the supreme human-lover of the Time Lords, certainly must feel at his sight and touch?

When the Doctor's beautiful, youthful, unscarred body was fully exposed and he allowed himself to be lain on the bed with his wrists fastened in soft straps, the Master tried to smash the screen. It was made of a super-strong alloy that only succeeded in bruising his hand.

Jack much more swiftly undressed himself. "You can act all coy, Doc, but you know what fun we had when I was traveling with you."

The Master stared. "What."

"You feel different now…" then when Jack descended upon him with lips and hands, he practically squealed, "Different can be good!"

"Tell me, has this sexy little body been through the paces yet?"

"Not this one, no…"

"Well, well, well…"

"The Doctor is MINE you freak!" the Master shrieked, but the Doctor was busy having some of the best sex of his life.

The Master huddled under the covers with the pillow clamped tightly over his ears for the remainder of the time, but he couldn't block out the Doctor's obscenely delighted moans from the man he most feared and hated.

…………………………………………………………………………………………….

The Master did not speak when the Doctor returned. "Are you all right?"

He did not respond. "Hello?"

The Doctor pulled the blankets off him and shone the light from his Sonic Screwdriver in his eyes. The pupils failed to dilate. "I'm sorry we had to resort to dirty tactics, but I know you well enough that I know you'd never break from pain or humiliation alone. Jack's memories did a lot more than Jack actually inflicted on you, as well. He only stays sane because that was the condition he was in when the Bad Wolf revived him the first time."

He stretched the catatonic Master out on his back atop the bed and gave him another injection. He pulled a chair up and put fingers on either side of the Master's face. "It's time to build you back up."

Jack returned a few minutes later – he had to tidy up after their sexcapades – with a glass of water and a plateful of custard creams. "It worked?"

The Doctor looked up briefly and smiled. "Yes. Though even if it hadn't, you're…er…superfine. Is that the cool way to say it?"

"In some time periods. Thanks. Why don't…I thought I bothered you too."

"I do have to consciously relax in your presence, but you don't just radiate your fixed-point-ness. You also radiate with love and trust in me. After all we've been through together, that overrides any unease."

Jack smiled. "You weren't too bad either, once I got over the impression I was tapping jailbait."

"Oi! I'll have you know that I was toppling governments when no part of you existed but mitochondrial DNA."

"Want a snack, kiddo?" Jack joked, tousling the Doctor's hair.

The Doctor laughed. "Busy right now. I'll have it in a bit, thanks." He began speaking beautiful, melodic, and untranslated words, very low.

"Is that Gallifreyan?"

"Yes."

"It's lovely."

"I'm finding the child he was before the drums. Speaking his language helps."

In truth, letting Jack sleep with him was a combination last-ditch tactic and a thank you. The actual repayment – after a bit of argument when they hatched the original plan – was to repair Jack's Vortex Manipulator such that he could travel through space but not time, because the Doctor had enough to do without worrying about another possible causer of paradox. The button that was originally meant to control time travel would instead call the Doctor for assistance, where he could get a ride in the TARDIS under the Doctor's supervision.

Jack knew the Doctor wouldn't mind him becoming his companion once more, but he also knew that the Master would not be able to handle Jack as a regular passenger. If Jack needed a short trip the Master could probably find enough rooms in the ship to hide from him.

Besides, Jack had been aware for several years now that no matter how much the Master had hurt him and how much Jack had done for him, the Doctor would need the Master more. This angered him for months after the Year, but when he had Gray put in suspended animation he thought he might possibly understand. Particularly if he imagined Gray was the last human being left in the universe.

He had lost him again, and lost his team and his lover, along with his desire to live on Earth for the next century or so. But at least he could give his one constant friend his own corner of peace.

"I'll be seeing you, Doctor," Jack said, kissing his forehead.

"Definitely, Jack," the Doctor replied, flashing him a smile. Jack saluted, pressed his newly operational wrist strap, and dematerialized.

The custard creams lay forgotten as, over the next six hours, five minutes, and forty-one seconds, the Doctor reconstructed what he could out of everything redeemable he found.

.........

Martha and Mickey Smith-Jones were celebrating their first anniversary with a picnic in the countryside, out under the stars. "Did I tell you about the time Rose and me were with him and we went on this 51st century spaceship and there were portals to 18th century France all over the place?"

Martha took another sip of champagne and laughed. "What on earth for?"

"There were these mental robots stalking Madame du Pompadour. They wanted to use her brain for their computer." Mickey lay back on the grass, marveling once again at how such a beautiful, brave, and intelligent woman had come to be his wife – though according to her the pressure of keeping her past with the Doctor and her work for UNIT and Torchwood secret had been too much of a strain on her relationship with Tom.

"Did I tell you that one of Shakespeare's sonnets was written for me?"

"You mean only one of them was?"

Then a very, very familiar sound reverberated across the hillside. Both of them jumped to their feet. They knew the Doctor would not be the one they had known.

"Blimey Doctor, you look younger than me," Mickey blurted out the moment he stepped out.

"Come ten more years and you'll be jealous," the Doctor said with a grin, shaking his hand. "Martha!"

She ran to him for a hug. "We were so worried about you. We knew you were going to change."

"I wasn't too thrilled about it, but this body's really grown on me. Think I'm still a looker?"

"If I wasn't worried about getting arrested, yes," she said, teasing.

"I came for a reason. Someone's here to apologize." The Doctor stuck his head back inside the TARDIS. "It's okay! Come out."

The Master emerged timidly, dressed in jeans and a black t-shirt. Martha gasped and backed away. "Is that Harold Saxon? I thought he was dead," Mickey said, confused.

"Mickey, this is my old friend-lover-enemy-friend-enemy-captor-enemy-cautious ally-enemy-captor-enemy-prisoner-friend-lover, the Master."

"You live long enough, your relationships can get really complicated," The Master murmured, looking at his shoes. He took the Doctor's hand as if for comfort.

"He's the only other Time Lord in existence, and he's here to say something to Martha. Yes, he was supposed to be dead, but he's awfully good at coming back. This time he has agreed to stay with me." The Doctor nudged him. "Go on."

The Master cleared his throat. "Martha Jones, I know that nothing I can say would ever be remotely adequate, but I'm sorry for what I did to you, your family, and the human race. And I promise I will never hurt the Doctor again."

"What did you do to him?" Martha asked the Doctor, but in a questioning rather than accusing way.

"What did the Master do in the first place?"

"I'll explain later, Mickey."

"He fixed me," the Master said. Then he squeezed the Doctor's hand and returned to the TARDIS.

"It wasn't the easiest process," the Doctor admitted, "but it had to be done."

"Are you happy, Doctor?"

He smiled just like her Doctor had. "Yes, Martha. Very much." He hugged the two of them goodbye.

…

Wilf immediately ran to the sound of the TARDIS. "You're alive, Doctor!" His face fell when he saw the Doctor's new self.

The Doctor put an arm around his shoulders. "Cheer up, Wilf. It was a good way to go, and I'm just as handsome, if not more. The TARDIS is redecorated too. I think you'll find it cleaner."

"It's like a café!" Wilf said as he viewed the console room. Then he spotted the Master crouched on a stairwell, reading a book. "What's he doing here?"

"I found the Master again and we…discussed things. He's my passenger now. Come shake hands with Wilf, Master."

"I am truly sorry for turning everyone into clones of myself and attempting to have my clones eat your granddaughter," the Master said slowly as he came forward.

"How did you…how has he changed?"

"It's been how long for you since those events?" the Doctor asked.

"Three years."

"For us it's been twenty. A lot can happen in twenty years."

Wilf reluctantly allowed the Master to shake his hand. "Don't you dare hurt the Doctor again, or anyone else for that matter."

"I mostly stay on the TARDIS these days," the Master said. "May I go to my room?"

"Go on ahead." As the meek form receded into the catacombs of the TARDIS, the Doctor put a hand on either side of Wilf's shoulders. "How's Donna?"

"Rich, but you know that. She's been doing a lot of charity work; she's very good at bullying people to donate."

"That's my Donna."

Wilf smiled. "She's expecting. If it's a boy she wants to name him John Temple-Noble and if it's a girl she wants to name her Martha Rose Temple-Noble. She has no idea why."

The Doctor sighed and gave Wilf a hug. "Give Sylvia my regards."

"Doctor?"

"Yes?"

"You did something to his mind, didn't you? He's been with you twenty years but he was evil for hundreds."

"I had to. It was the only way. He was too dangerous."

Wilf nodded. "That wasn't a great thing to do, but I don't see how you could have solved the problem without killing him either. I feel for you, having to make choices like that."

"It's…I…at least someone speaks my language, you know? Someone remembers me from before I ever stole this TARDIS."

"You stole it?"

"They were going to junk her. It was more like salvaging. Hello, saved the Earth, several planets, and occasionally the whole of reality how many times now? Sometimes you have to do something that's sort of bad to preserve something special."

Wilf laughed and thumped the Doctor on the back. "Promise me you'll pick up someone else to travel with, though. Not just him. It's not going to be good for you only keeping company with someone who does everything you say."

"You know me too well. Yes. I promise. I have someone – well, two someones – in mind."

"God bless you, sir."

"You too, Wilfred Mott."

….

"Tell me," the Doctor asked Amy when he stepped out of the TARDIS to find her and Rory standing on the lawn with fully packed suitcases in the middle of the night, "how much did I overshoot this time?"

"It's been three days, Doctor."

"How long did I say I was going to be gone?"

Rory said, "Two weeks. So…you actually messed up the right way this time."

"Three days." He massaged his temples. "It's been a bit longer for me. Doing this whole disproportionate thing in reverse. Still, you're both all packed and ready."

Amy noted the faint creases around his eyes, and she knew that Time Lords aged more slowly than humans even without changing. "How long?"

"Twenty years. It took a while to rehabilitate my friend. He's going to be traveling with us, if you don't mind. Come on inside, and we'll make introductions."

"Oh my God, it's Harold Saxon. How do you have Harold Saxon in your space ship?" Rory gasped.

"How do you even know what Harold Saxon looked like? He was in office for about a week before he died, and that was when we were kids."

"I did a report on him in school, okay?"

"That was an alias to try and take over the world," the black-clad man with short brown hair, about the same height and heft as the Doctor, with the face of the old Prime Minister. "Don't worry, I'm not interested in doing things like that anymore."

"Amy, Rory, this is the Master, and yes, he is a Time Lord like me, I know how I said I was the only one left but he turned out to have survived. Then he died, but then he came back, and then he disappeared, and when I sent you two home it was because I found him again. I had to make sure it would be safe for you to be around him."

"We were friends when we were children, and then enemies for several hundred years, and now we're...am I allowed to say it?"

The Doctor smiled and pulled the Master in for a kiss.

Rory nudged Amy and whispered, "You know, if you'd said something about this earlier I would have been a lot less jealous."

"He's definitely interested in some women; this is a surprise to me too. At least he can't yell at us anymore for shagging on his ship."

"Anyway! If you'd like to start up again where we left off, I'm happy to have you two aboard. Adventuring and so on. The Master generally doesn't go anywhere because a lot more people want to kill him than want to kill me, yes, I can see your faces. I know that's hard to believe."

"Okay. But only for a while, then we have to get back to our lives," Rory said.

"At some point we'll want to start a family."

"I think I'll go to our room, Doctor," the Master said quietly, hurrying away.

"Be patient with him, humans make him nervous now."

Rory took up the bags and headed for his and Amy's room. "You two catch up. I'll get our things settled."

"Why do you look sad underneath all your smiling, Doctor?" Amy asked, touching his cheek.

"I wish I hadn't been forced to do everything I did to save him," he said with a great sigh.

"What would have happened otherwise?"

"He would have eaten a lot of people alive and possibly conquered a few civilizations – he had this disease, it made him really hungry and super-strong – or he would be keeping me prisoner, or he'd be dead."

She rubbed his back. "You made the best of a bad situation, Doctor."

"Yeah. Why don't you help Rory? I'll look up a bunch of places and times we might enjoy."

"You can just say 'I'd like to be alone,' if you'd like to be alone."

"I just want to check on him, make sure he's handling your presence okay."

…..

"You like your pets better than me," the Master growled at him from his side of the bed when the Doctor entered. He was hugging his knees and staring at the wall.

"Master, I spent twenty years with only you. I sent them away so I could save you. But if it's just the two of us forever and ever, I'm going to start thinking I can change the world however I like. Then I'd eventually be as bad as you were. And you'd go down with me."

"Hmph."

The Doctor sat beside him and stroked his cheek. "They're very nice and they've never been affected by you, unless you count the Year they don't remember. You don't have to have dinner with us or anything like that. They're not going to hurt you."

"But they've never done you wrong. I have."

"I will never leave you," and then he said the Master's real name, not "Koschei" the schoolboy nickname, but his true, original name known only by his parents and the Doctor (the Master never married another of their kind, and his relationship with Lucy was hardly loving).

The Master said the Doctor's real name back, and pulled him down onto the bed by the bowtie. "If you really love me, you'll let them wait."

"They know where all the rooms are. They can go swimming or something."

"If you really really love me, you'll let me get out the handcuffs."

The Doctor knew he was going to get into some kind of relationship with River Song at some future point, but as far as he was aware she could be okay with sharing. She was from the 51st century after all. He wasn't going to let his and Jack's hard work go to waste.

Later, panting and most pleasantly exhausted, the Doctor asked, "Do you forgive me?"

"What for?"

"You know."

A long pause. The Master nestled more closely against the Doctor's smooth flesh. "I miss the confidence I had, and how everything was simple and I could just do what I felt like without considering moral consequences. And I don't like being ashamed of what I've done and not being able to face Earth people and other species from planets I've affected. But I don't miss fighting you. And I want to be here, now, with you."

"Me too."


End file.
